21.10.18

And how. 

Rising in Libra on the 9th October, the internet tells me that the new moon following the harvest 

does its best to calm everything down — to make pleasant, balanced, harmonious and fair what has been complicated, unpleasant, confrontational and unbalanced. This new Moon cycle presents us with a window of opportunity…

The Universe is on our side as we make our wishes and intentions…

And right on cue, as I was standing in line for my canteen lunch that day, I received a phone call telling me I had won a holiday from the back of a packet of Tyrell’s popcorn! (Ok, there is some discussion about whether the ‘prize’ is in fact a manufactured opportunity to sell a holiday timeshare, but that’s kind of missing the point…).

A short tarot reading reassured me that ‘the path you have taken is the true one’, and that I ‘will be guided’ in my new endeavour. Good stuff.

On the following Sunday, my endeavour seemed to be to turn my frozen harvest of Hippophaë rhamnoides L.— sea buckthorn berries (see blog 7. Surfacing) — into almost 2 litres of delicious syrup, following the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh’s secret recipe. It was a wonderful way to spend an autumnal afternoon, and it is such a joyful and satisfying process to take Mamma Nature’s bounty and celebrate it’s healing properties. The first wee bottle was sent on its way, to lend support to my daughter’s immune system in her first term at University.

And then the ultimate prize revealed itself: I am now in the probationary period of employment at one of the most revered herbalist institutions in the land!

October may have been windy but, with this kind of change in the air, I am very happy to be a leaf.